SURVEY QUESTION: MOVES!

[Reece]

In short, my thoughts on this subject are:

I agree with Dane... but Jeff's idea sounds kinda cool.



The more detail a move has, the easier it is for me to write if I'm fighting against your character in PvP or fighting alongside them in PvE. Detail matters because it means that the people you're writing with can easily tell how your moves work. I've looked at old moves, and I can say with certainty that many are too vague.

It isn't difficult to add details into a move. It may be difficult to balance them... I may write a move and think it deserves to be powerful, but then get told that it should actually only deal mediocre damage, given the strength of its drawbacks. But that's not such a big deal. Usually it just means changing a word or two and re-submitting it.

That said, I feel like for people who do struggle to do this, a list of example moves would be useful.
Yes, I know we already have one of those... but I mean a list that isn't grossly outdated.



Also:

Did a quick look at your Torch

"Short Melee Weapon"
"Fatigue Debuff"
"Area Debuff"
"Confusion Debuff"

Would that cover everything? Did I miss an option? With those, I think you could use flavour to make the Torch.

It's also got some buffs in there. But okay, yeah. Long as it's still possible to get creative in it, it sounds like a fair system.

Options (Mix and Match to create a Move!)


Burst Damage
Short Melee: weapons around the size of a dagger. Can include broken bottles, saps, brass knuckles, or even just energy coated fists.

Medium Melee: weapons around the size of a long sword. Can include hammers, clubs, sickles, shortspears, and the like.

Long Melee: weapons around the size of a spear. Can include whips, halberds, scythes, etc.

Slow Ranged: Ranged weapons which fire slowly. Shotguns, rocket launches, or charged energy attacks.

Average Ranged: Ranged weapons which fire as a moderate pace. Semi-automatic handguns, baseballs, etc.

Fast Ranged: Ranged weapons that fire at a quick pace. Machine guns or rapid fire ki attacks.

Debuffs
Damage over Time: Attacks which deal continuous damage over a period of time.

Slow: Attacks which limit an opponent’s movement.

Confusion: Attacks which limit an opponent’s understanding.

Lock: Attacks which can temporarily remove access to a Power.

Buffs
Attack Ally: Moves which can bring in objects or entities that attack foes.

Defend Ally: Moves which bring in objects or entities that defend the user or others.

Area: Moves which can affect multiple targets.

Power: Moves which can grant a Power to an ally.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This is a really simple list I did up for an example. It only has a few options on it (we’d want quite a few more), but with this list you have nearly infinite flavour for a variety of Buff, Debuff, and Attack Moves. You could make Thor’s Hammer, a Flamebrand, an M4 with Grenade Launcher, a Psychic Wave of Confusion, a Zombie, etc. Each option would be priced individually, with the more options you take, the more expensive the Move becoming. It also removes the need for most if not all Proficiencies, by adding the cost for these into the “Option Costs.” And we should be able to refit all the existing Moves within this system, though the pricing of quite a few would probably increase.

I can't promise it would fix every issue, but it'd be simple to build Moves (just pick the options that fit what you want to do), simple to Price (all the prices for the Move are built from the options), and simple to approve (does the Move include what they purchased and nothing more?).

To me this basically sounds like you're saying "pay 300 OM for each Prof/Power requirement"... yeah, I know that that's not exactly what you mean, but for simplicity's sake I think it'd be better to either change the 'option costs' to match the power/proficiency lists we already have... or change the proficiency list to match the option costs and just have powers being purely stand-alones that are never used in move creation.
Which... is actually a really interesting idea. I do like the current system, but if it was to be changed at all then something like this seems like it'd be an interesting way to do it.

That said, I don't agree with removing the Proficiencies. The move costs, IMO, should be in addition to buying those. It's already much easier to get lots of moves than to buy even a few stat-upgrades, PU-upgrades or alternate forms... if that was to change then I'd argue that everything else should be reduced in cost too, to make the system fairer for low-complexity, high-power characters (e.g. Kenpachi).

The idea of paying 300 for each requirement is a very simple and easy way of pricing moves, which would allow people like CP to do a whole lot of interesting things without necessarily having to spend an absolute fortune in OM. It would also be far, far, far more balanced than what Bandit is suggesting.
Sorry dude, it's nothing personal, but basing move prices off of narrative opportunities/restrictions is a terrible idea. It's extremely vague and therefore easy to misinterpret. It would be essentially unmanageable. Move pricing would be absurdly inconsistent...


The only other thing I'd like to add is that if we were to try something like Jeff's suggestion (which actually sounds more appealing to me the more I think about it...) we would still need to make sure that appropriate aesthetic detail is included.
Mickey mentioned that he got a move approved recently without describing its appearance... I'm not sure how that happened, but it shouldn't have. Aesthetics are vitally important to people you're writing with and who will need to write your moves in their posts.